TN PoLOLitics!

Every week when I sit to write this column, I check what the competition is up to. By competition, I mean: Tamil Nadu politics.

For us, humour writers, the task of trying to match TN politicians in eliciting laughter out of public is always daunting because they (politicos) tend to do it so effortlessly.

Take the case of T Rajendher. (I am not sure whether this is his chosen spelling for the day. He changes his spelling more times than he changes his dress. I am not even sure whether this is his right name at all. The thing is TR himself may not know. For the record, he has so far been officially: T Rajendher, T Rajendherr, T Rajendhar, T Rajendar, Vijaya T Rajendar and T Harry Potter Rajendher. The last one may seem a joke. But I am not sure. Also, you can’t also discount the possibility of Aadhaar officials spelling his name T Rachendar. I will not be surprised if there is a separate department in the government just to handle the various names of TR.)

Anyway, T Rajendhar who has been running a party for the last 14 years, went ahead and made a spectacular announcement last week: He renamed his party from ‘Latchiya DMK’ to ‘Elatchiya DMK’.

Seriously, that is what he did. It was as if he was telling the people of Tamil Nadu, “Hey! you asked the parties in the State to change. See, I have changed my party!”

I am sure this is what the people of TN are collectively thinking now: “Oh! TR has changed ‘Latchiya’ to ‘Elatchiya’. This should solve all the problems facing the State. This will, logically speaking, put pressure on the Centre to set up the Cauvery river water authority. The NEET exam has to be abolished because of this. Further, if this can be applied right on the area of cancer, all the cancer cells will die immediately.”

But enough of TR, because we have to urgently bring up Deepa Madhavan, the niece of former Chief Minister J Jayalalithaa, who is now the official clown of Tamil Nadu.

She was in the news a few weeks back because a fake income tax official tried to raid her house, and when he was caught, he told the police that he was asked to pose as an I-T sleuth by Deepa’s husband Madhavan. The man also said that he was interested in acting, and Madhavan had told him that he would get him a chance to act in a film provided he passed this ‘acting test’. But nobody wondered whether this claim was true, and why would any man attempt such machinations against his own wife. Everyone kind of felt that it must have been true based on the irrefutable proof that the couple involved was Deepa and Madhavan.

The police too did not seem to press any charge because the case would have panned out like this:

Judge: The crime seems to be serious. Cheating, impersonation, trespassing and what not. You can slap cases under multiple sections of both CrPC and IPC.

Advocate: Your Honour, it may indeed be the case. But when Section 420 and the other relevant sections are read in conjunction with the fact that the case involves Deepa and Madhavan…

Judge: Deepa and Madhavan? (Starts laughing uncontrollably). You should have stated this up front. Case dismissed (Continues to laugh enormously, leaving pools of drool on case files.)

Deepa and Madhavan are basically real-life version of on-screen Goundamani and Senthil, okay much more howlarious, with each trying to get at the other with never-ending silly schemes, even while telling the world that the two are indeed together as a pair.

Deepa runs a political outfit. Madhavan also has a separate one. But wait. He is a member of his wife’s political organ too. He was expelled from it. But he was taken back after it probably came to light to Deepa that without Madhavan in the party the party’s total membership came down precipitously by 50%.

Deepa also famously said that she should have been called to lead the government when her aunt Jayalalithaa died, “The Constitution is clear,” she sincerely said in an TV interview, “that I, as her closest blood relative, should have been asked to form the government.” The TV interviewer deserved a Pulitzer then and there for his remarkable restraint and not falling and rolling on the floor in laughter.

So, as I was saying, with such people around, we humour writers have little chance. But wait, what if I join Deepa’s political outfit? But I draw a line at joining forces with T Rajendher. Have no intention of spelling Crank’s Corner as, I don’t know, Crank’s Cornerrrrr!